


As Though Nothing Could Fall

by jennandblitz



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, Canonical Character Death, First War with Voldemort, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Love Confessions, M/M, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Minor Character Death, Off-screen, POV Alternating, Pining, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:15:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25768780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jennandblitz/pseuds/jennandblitz
Summary: The forest is full of Death Eaters, and memories. Sirius, who isn't prone to planning more than his next five minutes, sees one—or maybe both?—and puts both he and Remus in a situation in which it is impossible to keep secrets, too.We could steal time just for one dayWe can be heroes for ever and everWhat d'you say?
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 9
Kudos: 71
Collections: Wolfstar Hurt Fest





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For Wolfstar Hurt Fest:  
>  _Prompt 29  
>  Prompt: In the first war, Sirius and Remus are caught in a cursed trap during an Order mission. One of them is bleeding out fast and they can't use magic. Rescue may or may not be coming, and death looms closer and closer.  
> Requests/Comments: Confessions of feelings, lots of blood and angst, please!_
> 
> Thank you to S and L for the wonderful beta! And to my prompter, I hope you enjoy!

It’s August.

Sirius has to remind himself of that, with the way darkness seems to shroud him in this forest. He has no idea how long he’s been here, or how long he has left to go. Time moves differently in this liminal space, strung up by adrenaline, focus, and a shred of fear he does not let himself linger on. It shouldn’t be dark, nor should it be as disorienting as it is. It’s late evening, and the sun should still be creeping through the trees, but it’s not. Something is blocking it, something magical, some ward or concealment charm, _something_ that makes Sirius’ skin prickle, the hairs on his arms lift back and goosebumps spread.

He’s no stranger to the dark, of course. He’s no stranger to the forest either, used to running every month with Moony, Prongs and Wormtail, used to rolling in the dirt and tracking the scents of rabbits or other small creatures. It’s not a rabbit he’s tracking now, though, and his wand is in his left hand, gripped tight, and his boot-clad feet are moving as silently as they can amongst the undergrowth. His heart is in his throat, thudding. He’s by himself, maybe that’s part of it. James has been in hiding with Lily and Harry for just over six weeks, Peter didn’t turn up for his own part in the mission—but Sirius can’t think on that or he’ll be consumed with worry for his friend—and Remus, _oh_ … it’s not worry that consumes him when he thinks of Remus.

A branch crunches somewhere in the depths of the forest to his left, and Sirius’ head whips around to look for the source of the noise. Is it one of those creatures, or is it a wizard in a mask, a death mask, with wand raised, a green-light curse on their lips?

But then Sirius sees a flash of something, obscured by the foliage but clear as day to him, clear as nothing is in this moment. A flicker of light, from _somewhere_ , from a passing spell or from the dregs of sunset knicking through the wards, catches on sandy blond curls. Sirius knows that exact shade of blonde, that exact cowlick at the temple, at _Remus’_ temple.

He’s not alone, then. Remus creeps alongside him, his eyes no doubt scanning the brush for any sign of Death Eaters. Sirius isn’t sure if Remus sees him, but he doesn’t want to give away his position. With far too much effort, Sirius drags his gaze away from Remus, from that profile, the crookedness of his nose, the sloped shoulders of a man who has spent a lifetime wishing he were elsewhere. But they are both here, and there is nothing they can do about it. Sirius can’t back out. He doesn’t know what it’s like to step down from a challenge or a confrontation, wouldn’t know _how_ to do that. Dumbledore knows that, he’s sure. Albus knows that he just has to let the whirlwind of Sirius Black free and it will result in _something_. The desolation of half the Death Eaters? The levelling of an entire forest? The death of a whirlwind that causes him more trouble than it’s worth? All seem like reasonable outcomes.

Deep inside, buried in his heart, beneath blood and bone and flesh, Sirius _knows_ he will not survive this war. It’s too much. _He’s_ too much. Too impulsive to run in and fight, too eager to draw the wrath of the very people he used to sit at Sunday lunch with, too headstrong, too brash, too—too—too—

But Sirius can’t think on that either. He has to slow the juggernaut of his mind, has to stop it spiralling and spinning. He must focus on the task, focus on the forest before him and the battle that lies within; because somewhere in this forest, the Death Eaters are gathering. Somewhere, beyond these concealment charms, beyond the thicket, beyond the dread of it all, the people Sirius wants dead more than almost anyone else in the world are all gathered, like fish in a barrel. Magic thickens the air between the tree trunks, an old place of power, a _Pureblood_ place of power, knitted around standing stones and the hallowed ground within. No one knows what the Death Eaters are doing here, but the magic buffeting Sirius in constant waves is strong enough to make him want to stop them in their tracks.

To his left—Remus is on his right, on his vulnerable side, left hand holding his wand, how easy it is to flick a curse _that_ way—a flash of movement catches Sirius’ eye. He feels like he’s hyper alert in moments like these. Dumbledore has given them their mission, and that was all they had to do, but this felt like walking right into the lion’s den. Only he and Remus, the other teams approaching from other directions, so there shouldn’t be any movement—

There. Again. A flash of blonde curls. A build he recognises from years of Quidditch training with her.

But Marlene McKinnon is dead. Her entire family is dead. Sirius had grieved for her like the sister he had never had, sick to his stomach with it when Dumbledore had gathered them and broken the news. Sirius had been the one to catch Dorcas outside the room, her eyes wet and red with unshed tears of fury. He’d been the one, in seventh year, to see the two girls in the common room and ask Marlene if they really were… _you know_.

_This ends_ , Dorcas had said, her mouth in a tight line and her wand in a tight grip. She’d shaken Sirius’ hand from her arm, all fury and fire, and stormed outside, the magic around her like a heavy moth-eaten cloak.

He had run after her, of course. Sirius knew just how thin the thread suspending them all was, recognised the spark of foolish impulsivity, the dry tinder of the war so ready to burn.

Sirius knew where she’d gone—to the McKinnon’s. The pops of Apparition were like the hooves of charging war horses, as Sirius had run inside to call them to arms, to follow after one of their strongest witches on her path for vengeance. Sirius landed—surrounded by Moody, Kingsley, Caradoc, Hestia, with James, with Remus, with Peter, all ready for the worst—to see Dorcas, arm raised aloft, and the Dark Mark streaming in violent blood red (red for rage, for love, Gryffindor red for Marlene) from her wand. Sirius hadn’t truly realised that any old wizard can cast _Morsmordre_ —and it would be a lie to say he hadn’t thought of it himself once or twice in recent months, just to get it over with.

The Death Eaters landed next, like a plague of locusts, and for one terrifying, heart-in-throat moment Dorcas was facing them alone, firing off curses and her voice raised over the din, screaming for Voldemort, for vengeance.

When the smoke cleared, the dregs of battle amongst the cinder-strewn wreckage of the McKinnon estate, they found Dorcas beneath that blood-red skull, turned green now. The sickly light reflected over her skin, turning emerald and velvet, and shone in her eyes that Kingsley had closed with the lightest touch.

Sirius will never forget that, sees it when he closes his eyes. He is twenty-one, and he has seen his friends die, over and over and over. He tries not to think on how they will react when he dies.

With a shaky breath, Sirius turns back to the weaving path before him. Marlene McKinnon isn’t in this forest with him. It’s the light, the lack of it, the heavy atmosphere and the lead weight of fear. He’s seeing things. It’s the lack of sleep—too wired, too manic, too desperate to cram everything into his existence before he dies—and the lack of any real substance or grounding. Maybe Sirius is dead already, and he’s seeing his friends calling him towards them.

No, that can’t be it, can it?

Sirius looks to his right again, Remus, there’s Remus. The curl of his sandy blond hair, some mysterious shade between blond and brown that Sirius feels like he can see in his sleep, when he _does_ sleep. He’s still alive, isn’t he? Sirius would know if Remus died, he’d _feel it_ , he’s sure.

The forest seems to be slowly filling with a greenish light, as if they are drawing closer to their end destination, and Sirius isn’t sure if he’s ready but he’s going to run in anyway, run in and try to take as many Death Eaters out with him as possible, make sure that Voldemort can’t get to James, to Lily, to Harry. That’s as close to a plan as Sirius Black gets. These hallowed, old places are full of ghosts, and Sirius refuses to let any of the people he cares about become one with the trees and the thicket.

Remus looks over at him, perhaps some part of him is aware of Sirius’ gaze, and it’s too dark, just greenish smog, to see the colour of his eyes, to see the smattering of his freckles, but Sirius sees the vague shape of him. They are used to picking each other out in the forest, in some way. Remus gives him a smile, and Godric it might be the first genuine smile Sirius has seen in days, _weeks_ , because the Potters are holed up, Pete hasn’t smiled since last Yule, and everyone else is too concerned about dying. But Remus smiles, and Sirius lives to bask in the moonlight of it.

Sirius could stare at Remus’ face, at the silhouette he casts, for the longest time, but there’s movement over Remus’ shoulder, a splash of light, the arcing crack of a spell. And that spell is one Sirius knows instantly.

There is a spell Sirius can call up as instinctively as he breathes, a spell that he can fling at an opponent for the opening volley of a duel without even thinking. Orion taught him that spell, in the parlour room of Grimmauld Place with Regulus opposite him. They had cast it at each other of course, known just how it hurt to have fire spring alive and wrap its way around them. There’s only one other person that could cast that spell. Only… is he here?

“Regulus!” Sirius’ voice sparks in his throat, and before he can do anything to stop it, he’s sprinting past Remus towards the outline of his brother amongst the trees.

“Fucking _shit_ , Padfoot,” Remus hisses as Sirius runs past him, makes to grab at him but Remus’ reactions are slower and Sirius is already thundering through the undergrowth towards that spectre. Regulus can’t be here, can he?

Somewhere distantly, Sirius should be thankful the forest is dense and dark, the sound of their footfalls dampened by the closeness of it, but he just wants to get to Regulus. Because this forest is full of ghosts, and Regulus _can’t_ be one of them.

“Padfoot!” Remus calls, trying to keep his voice down, Sirius assumes. He doesn’t listen.

Sirius is scrambling over a fallen tree trunk when a pain only akin to one thing strikes through his right leg. For a terrifying moment it feels like _teeth_ , and Sirius thinks of the werewolf bite on Remus’ thigh, almost the same place as the pain sinking into his leg. His leg goes numb, painful and numb at the same time, sharp and venomous and horrible. Sirius looks down, wavering on the spot, to see a pale purple bear trap snapped shut just above his knee. When he tries to touch it his fingers sink through it with a freezing sensation, incorporeal somehow.

“Padfoot?”

Just for a moment, Sirius’ breath is knocked from him by the pain, the way he can’t seem to move past it or make his leg listen to him or do _anything_. He’s heard of these kind of curses before, or hexes, he can’t quite remember their name for the way his brain is screaming. Whenever Sirius visited his aunt and uncle at their country estate, Cygnus would mention the trapping hexes— _to keep the Muggles out_.

It’s dark, but Sirius can see the faint spread of blood down the leg of his black jeans, feel the wetness of it rushing down like a waterfall. The pale purple light of the bear trap casts a glow across his skin, and he can see every single tooth of it dug into his flesh. He can’t look away from it, can’t take a full breath in, can’t make his mouth form any semblance of a word, just hanging open in shock.

“Ah...”

“Hey…” Remus is closer now, his hand on Sirius’ arm. “It wasn’t… oh _fuck_.”

So it’s real then.

Sirius’ knees buckle around the same time as that realisation, and Remus just about catches him, stumbling under the weight of them both. They fall to the ground in a tangle of limbs that makes Sirius throb with agony, twist his leg and sink those incorporeal teeth only deeper and deeper. His head spins. Was that Regulus in the forest, or were the trees playing tricks on him? He knows he needs a healing spell or something to neutralise this but he can’t _think_ beyond the pain.

“Fuck, shit,” Remus mutters, extracting himself from their tangle, kneeling up next to Sirius and drawing his wand. Sirius’ head is against a rock, but it’s spinning and the whole forest is upending.

They’ve fallen in a rare slant of moonlight, tinged green and Sirius finds himself thanking _something_ for the fact he can see Remus’ face. His sandy curls are awry, and there’s a leaf stuck in one whorl of it. His eyes are wide with panic, skittering over Sirius’ body, lingering on the trapping hex still sunk into his thigh. His wand is shaking a little in his fingers as he glances around, then back to Sirius.

“Ah—Moony—”

“It’s alright Padfoot. We’ll… fucking hell, this needs a counter charm, doesn’t it?”

Sirius can feel his lips curling up, unbidden, into a soft smile. Remus’ brows are furrowed in concentration, his lips moving soundlessly as he rifles through the information in his head, what curse, what remedy. All Sirius can think is how fucking beautiful he looks like this.

“Padfoot? Sirius?”


	2. Chapter 2

“ _Episkey.”_

No. That’s too minor, meant for broken noses or black eyes, not some magical bear trap sunk deep into his best friend’s leg where Remus _knows_ there’s a vein. He tries anyway.

“ _Reparifors.”_

Magical ailments, Pomfrey had said, like a throat-seizing charm or a blinkering spell or a body-bind. Not a horrific curse probably set by Death Eaters in the middle of a forest and Remus can _see_ the blood staining the dirt and leaves beneath Sirius.

“Sirius, talk to me,” Remus says, trying not to let his hand shake. “Do you know what this is?”

Sirius is pale usually, the aristocratic fuck, even though it’s summer, but he’s ghostly white now, almost greyish. He looks tired, he looks… He’s _smiling_ though, the fucking prick, like this is some epic jape to him but that trap is still in his leg and the pool of blood is growing and growing. It looks like— _it looks like…_

“Trapping Hex,” Sirius says weakly, regaining some control over his body as he pushes himself up to sitting against a tree stump. “Trying to remember the counter charm for releasing it.”

Remus bites his lip. He doesn’t know trapping _hexes_ , but he knows traps; Remus used to go out with his Da into the forests behind the house to check the traps for rabbits that his Ma would skin and turn into stew. Da would tell him of his friend who stepped in one, who lost his foot and nearly bled out. So Remus knows—unfortunately—that even if they manage to ease open the trap, the wound will still be there and it will bleed and bleed and bleed.

“Yeah,” Remus retorts, wishing he knew this better. “Remember harder, Pads.” He tries for dry and witty, sarcastic and typical Moony, so the others have told him, but it just sounds desperate.

Remus _is_ desperate.

Up until now he’s avoided going on any missions with Sirius. He’s blamed the moon or begged Dumbledore to relieve him of this mission or that mission because Sirius will be there. But it’s not because he can’t work well with Sirius—Merlin knows all four of the Marauders can work together seamlessly—but rather than Sirius is _distracting_.

Sirius Black, with his stupid hair and his stupid jeans and his stupid smile and _fuck_ , Remus can’t lose him.

Remus has lost count of the times he’s glanced up to Sirius and then lost track of time. Remus could watch his friend do the most mundane of tasks and be enthralled, try to ignore the butterflies in his stomach because he’s known for a while that this is _more_ than friends. Sirius when he’s stood in the kitchen, making tea the Muggle way like Remus and Peter are trying to teach him and James. He’s always caught in such concentration that Remus has to bite back the urge to just blurt out with it— _dear God, man, how are you so beautiful?_

“Ooh, tetchy,” Sirius mutters. He sounds like he’s just reclining on the sofa, remarking on how Remus is grumpy about how bad this cup of tea is.

Remus can’t help rolling his eyes, looking up through the fuzzy edges of his hair—long, too long, he needs to get it cut—to see Sirius smiling sardonically. “Should’a known you’d do some big event like this, Pads. Can’t let a mission get boring, can you?” He gives his own smile back, turning his wand between his fingers and trying with everything he has to keep the fear and nervousness and weight on his shoulders from showing.

Sirius snickers a laugh. For a moment Remus can fool himself into thinking they’re fine—that Sirius is just joking around and they’ll get up and Apparate out of here, go to Caradoc to fix him up. But Sirius’ jaw is clenching tight, the tendons in his neck jumping, his fingers pressing into the dirt either side of him and that pool of blood in the earth beneath him is still spreading wider and darker.

“Absolutely not, Moons. Who do you take me for?” He shifts again and Remus doesn’t miss the flash of pain across his beautiful features.

“The counter charm, Sirius. Talk to me,” Remus reminds him, putting his hand on Sirius’ other knee to try and keep him here. When they were at school and stuck on a homework problem or the logistics of a prank, the four of them would sit cross-legged in a circle and throw ideas out until one of them stuck.

Sirius shakes his head. “Blocked all that Pureblood shit out, haven’t I? It’s… _solvo_ … _solvo_ something.”

“Then can we Apparate out of here?”

Another shake of his head, and this time he winces, tries to hide it on a sharp inhale but Remus sees it because he’s spent so many years studying the minutiae of Sirius Black’s face. “It’ll Splinch me—fucking Merlin—because it’s tethered here. Have to—have to release it.”

“Fuck, Padfoot… We need to release it… take it Muggle brute force won’t do it?” Remus shuffles closer on his knees, feels his palms, the legs of his jeans, soak with blood. Sirius might be wearing black jeans but Remus’ are pale blue and for one morbid moment he watches the rust-red of his best friend’s blood inch up the fabric.

“Nah,” Sirius says, his voice sounding a little closer to tremulous. “It’s… it’s an unlocking spell, Moons. Like _Alohamora_ … but not.”

Remus likes to think he’s great at Defence, and pretty decent at Charms—it’s the bit he allows himself to feel good about, not Transfiguration (woeful), or Care of Magical Creatures (his own wellbeing attests to that), or Duelling (awful, and he desperately needs to be better, _clearly_ )—but the counter charm doesn’t float to the forefront of his brain.

Realistically, Remus knows he’s panicking far too much to rifle through the information properly. Because there is Sirius, the boy he’s loved since sixth year, since he looked over one day in Potions and thought, _Merlin, fuck. I want to know what his mouth feels like on mine_ , and he’s bleeding.

“Right, err—” Remus’ voice is shaking now too, and he pushes a hand through his hair, belated realising it streaks him in blood. _Sirius’_ blood.

“Fuck, _fuck_. Fuck, c’mon, what the hell is it?” Sirius asks himself, knocking his head back against the tree trunk he’s slumped at as if the impact might dislodge the fact from the spiderweb of his mind. He clenches his eyes shut for a moment, then looks at Remus, cocks his head, furrows his brow. “That’s… my blood, isn’t it?”

Remus nods. He doesn’t mention that it’s soaking the ground beneath them—starting to pool now in fact, the soil too saturated in it to keep up—or that Sirius’ own hands are even bloodier. He has one hand pressed atop his thigh, the other balled into a tight fist on his opposite knee.

“Fuck.”

There’s silence for a moment, nothing beyond the rasping, shallow breaths Sirius is heaving, and a cricket chirping, somewhere.

Sirius cocks a smile again. “Look like a Prewett with your hair that colour.”

Remus rolls his eyes. “Shut up Padfoot. Think of the counter charm, will you?”

Sirius’ smile drains out of him along with a handful more of the colour in his cheeks. “Right.” His wand is still in his hand, and he levels it at his thigh. Remus pretends not to notice how much he’s shaking, how the blood on his hand is dripping off the tip of his wand. “ _Alohamora_ —ah!” He doubles over in immediate pain, a groan so loud Remus is terrified the Death Eaters will come running, but it’s still silence around them. Sirius’ body is one tight line, chin to his chest, face screwed up. He dislocated his shoulder once during a Quidditch match, and Remus had thought he was in pain then, but that’s nothing—even with the way the joint hung limp and bruised black for weeks—compared to this.

“Why would it be that!?” Remus cries, shuffling forward again and putting his hand on Sirius’ calf. He wants to chastise him, but he can’t pour any kind of vehemence into his voice when Sirius is practically screaming in pain.

“Don’t know!” He grits out, shaking his head. “Worth a fuck—fucking try, isn’t it?”

Remus goes to retort with a _no_ , with a _not when it hurts you, not when you’re hurting because my heart wrenches itself in two when you hurt_. But… what was the alternative? No counter charm, and Sirius bleeds out in the forest? Is Splinching worth it? Godric, Remus’ stomach twists, it _can’t be_. They have to keep trying. Remus’ gaze drifts back to the wound. It seems the teeth have sank even deeper with the charm, biting and pooling with blood. It looks pearlescent, like an oil slick, black and dangerous, in the light.

“What about—” Remus rubs a hand over his forehead, more blood but he can’t care— “what about the one Pomfrey used for when Dor—Dorcas angered that hippogriff?”

Sirius’ eyes are swimming, and Remus thinks he’s looking at him strangely. It’s likely the blood loss, the panic setting in. “Yeah—fuck, yeah, err. _Vulnera Sanentur._ ”

That time Sirius doesn’t cry out in pain, but his body goes rigid and his breath floods out of his lungs. Remus grabs his hand without thinking, just wanting to help _somehow_ , and Sirius squeezes back so tightly Remus bites his lip.

“Not—fuck, fucking hell—not that one,” Sirius says weakly. The wound has _tried_ to knit back together. It’s just that the spectral bear trap is still within the meat of Sirius’ thigh, and the flesh is trying to heal _around_ it.

“Sorry, sorry,” Remus mutters, still holding Sirius’ hand. He can feel the slip of blood between them, warm and sticky, and Sirius’ heartbeat is throbbing in his wrist. Remus wants to take his hand and kiss his knuckles and lean forward and kiss his stupid, smarmy mouth, but he _can’t_.

Sirius shakes his head. “No, s’fine. Gotta… keep trying.”

Remus nods again. Sirius is staring at the bear trap, and then Remus feels him shift, lace their fingers together as if it’s no big deal, but it _is_. He forces himself to breathe.

“Could we… banish it?” Sirius’ fingers are so pale against his, shaking.

“Don’t wanna banish your leg.”

Silence, crickets chirping. Remus strains to hear the sound of approaching footsteps or the whisper of a curse.

“Better one leg than dead, huh?”

“Sirius… don’t say that.”

He’s right, though. What if he does die? Should Remus spill his secrets now then? Take Sirius’ face between his hands and say _I love you, and I’ve loved you and nothing but you for years._ But that feels too much like goodbye. Deathbed confessionals.

Sirius shifts, tries to sit up a little more, and his hand squeezes tight in Remus’ palm. He’s not sure if it’s his hand shaking or Sirius’ but it feels like they’re one here, now. “Right, aren’t I? Sirius is stupid and runs after a ghost and he’ll die in the forest in the stupidest way possible.”

“You’re not stupid, Padfoot… you’re the smartest person I know. You’re…” Remus can’t answer. The only word that springs to the tip of his tongue is _everything_.

Silence again. Maybe the word is too obvious between them. Maybe Sirius is trying to figure out how to tell Remus he’s not interested, despite the fact he’s bleeding out. Remus watches the bear trap, the way blood seems to pool and disperse around the teeth with every one of Sirius’ thundering heartbeats. When Sirius still doesn’t say anything, but just squeezes his fingers tighter into Remus’, Remus convinces himself to look up. Sirius looks… Remus has never seen him look like this, forlorn, devastated, so blurred around the edges that Remus realises there are tears in his eyes, his vision misty.

“Fuck, Moony. I should’a kissed you in sixth year when I had the chance.”


	3. Chapter 3

It might be the way Sirius’ vision is blurry at the edges, consciousness dancing around him like a frightened Flutterby, but Remus looks _beautiful_. He’s only slightly aware of the words slipping out of his mouth, but Sirius has only regretted three things in his life, so he stands by his decision.

It doesn’t stop his heart hammering harder, though, making his leg throb, the pain of the failed counter charms only digging it deeper making it feel as if every heartbeat takes a mallet to his leg bone. Remus’ eyebrows hike up towards his blood-smudged hairline— _Sirius’ blood_ —as his mouth hangs open just for a moment.

“What?” He says, barely a whisper, barely a breath that Sirius almost doesn’t hear over the pounding of his heart.

Sirius swallows. He feels like there’s blood in his mouth but there can’t be, so maybe it’s just so strong in the air that he can taste it. Remus’ eyes are wide and staring at him as if he’s just turned into a Doxy and is currently hanging off the nearest tree. Honestly, that’s probably what Sirius feels like right now; he is all adrenaline, pain and blood.

“I said… I should’ve kissed you in sixth year. In the secret passage when we—fuck—when we had to squeeze into that gap. I should’ve kissed you, should’ve been a bloody Gryffindor and kissed you.” At that last sentiment Sirius drops his head back against the tree stump, his head too heavy to bear, his pulse still throbbing.

When he opens his eyes again after a few beats of silence, Remus still looks like James whenever Binns called on him for an answer in History of Magic; a deer in the headlights if there ever was one. He frowns, then lifts a hand to his face to scrub at the vague stubble on his cheeks. The action smears him with blood, like fucking everything seems to do at the moment because they are both _covered_ in blood, in Sirius’ blood and he’s still bleeding and—how much blood can a wizard lose before he dies?

When Remus drops his hand again, he gives Sirius a look. He can’t name the feeling on Remus’ face, can’t name whether it’s elation or confusion or anger. He still looks beautiful, and Sirius pushes himself up on his hands to sit a little straighter. He wants to lean forward and wipe the blood from Remus’ cheek but his own hands are caked in it too.

“You mean that?”

Sirius nods, lifts his hand from where it’s clenched into the mulch and holds it out to Remus. “Yeah, I do. Think about it all the time.”

Remus blinks. His fair eyelashes catch the moonlight. He looks a little longer, just _looking_ at Sirius like he can see something more than a disinherited Pureblood traitor bleeding out on the floor of a forest because he was stupid enough to chase a ghost. Then, his fingers shaking only slightly less than Sirius’, he slides his palm against Sirius’, laces their fingers together and squeezes.

“I… I wish you had too. I wish _I_ had.”

Sirius squeezes their hands, a call and response in time with his heartbeat. “Yeah?” He says, soft and he’s not sure if it’s the conversation or how faint he feels. When Remus nods, Sirius tugs his hand, trying to pull him closer.

“Your leg, Sirius, can we—” Remus breaks off into a little chuckle as Sirius watches blood drip from their joined fingers— “can we have love life revelations when you’re not dying?”

“No,” Sirius retorts, huffing a laugh that tastes like Knuts and copper cauldrons. “Moons, if I’m dying, I want to kiss the boy I’ve been in love with for years.”

Sirius has only _seen_ a person’s heart break once—when Lily refused to accompany James to Puddifoot’s for the 300th anniversary of the cafe, with banners and cake and all sorts of charmed frou-frou garbage—but he can mark that up to two now; Remus’ face crumples, his eyebrows pitching together, the corners of his mouth turning down.

“Pads… you’re not dying.” When Sirius goes to interrupt him— _I am_ —Remus tuts and speaks a little louder. “I won’t _let_ you die. Not now. You’re not telling me you _love me_ , like I’ve loved you for just as long, and then fucking _dying_.”

“Kiss me.” It’s all Sirius can say for a moment, as the pain washes over him anew and he can only think of dying here. “I swear to Merlin, Moony, if I could move without screaming I would’ve tackled you to the floor and snogged the living daylights out of you already. Kiss me.”

Remus stares a moment longer, and Sirius can feel his pulse beating in his fingertips, imagines every drop of blood is going to flood out of him here in this forsaken forest. Then, in a moment Sirius wants to pour into a Pensieve, to keep forever, Remus bites his lip and leans forward. He’s just to the side of Sirius, so he tilts his head to meet him, Remus kneeling at the altar of the forest to try and bargain for Sirius’ life. His knees are almost against Sirius’ thigh, not quite touching for fear of hurting him, but so close. His mouth is closer, then closer still. Sirius gives a sharp inhale then Remus is _kissing him_.

They’re kissing, and Sirius lifts a hand to cup at the hinge of Remus’ jaw, press his thumb over it to feel the way Remus’ kisses become Sirius’ kisses and they’re kissing together, all melding into one. Perhaps it’s not the filth-laden, lurid thing Sirius had imagined when he used to lie in the Gryffindor dorms and stare at Remus’ curtains. It’s not full of tongue and teeth, gasping and pawing at each other and quickly followed by some high energy fuck against the nearest available surface, overcome with want and adoration, but it’s _beautiful_. Sirius hums against the chapped skin of Remus’ lips—he’s _so bad_ at moisturising—and lets his tongue furl a slow loop over Remus’ bottom lip.

In fifth year, when in the Forbidden Forest with a stag, a rat and a dog, Moony chipped a tooth on Prongs’ antlers, play fighting with a little too much enthusiasm. Sirius remembers when Remus came to that morning with a mouthful of blood, and the panic that ensued. Pomfrey couldn’t fix it, or wouldn’t perhaps, so since then, Remus’ bottom left canine has been chipped. When Sirius’ tongue slides over the precipice of his bottom lip, it catches on that jagged bit of tooth, and that— _that, of all things_ —sparks something in Sirius’ memory.

“Fuck,” Sirius mumbles into the kiss, and Remus just hums back, but Sirius pulls away, slides that hand from Remus’ jaw onto his shoulder to push him back. “The counter charm.” That makes Remus tip back, and Sirius remembers his hand is still clenched around his wand, pressed atop the meat of his thigh like the sturdiness of his arm is the only thing keeping it upright. Beneath his rushing heartbeat, Sirius can hear Remus’ breathing short and sharp. When his gaze flickers up, just briefly, to look at him, Remus is flushed and his eyes are molten honey, something floating in them that Sirius has never seen before.

“Your tooth—the charm, it’s about the teeth of the trap— _Solvomordi—_ ” then again, with conviction, with his wand levelled at the spectral trap encasing his leg, blood and bone— “ _Solvomordi_.”

The Trapping Hex shimmers with a bright light, then, after a torturous handful of seconds, where Sirius can taste Remus’ skin on his lips and doesn’t dare look up at him, it dissipates. The shards of it flitter out into the night air as if they were never there in the first place. Sirius watches one of them carried perhaps by the night breeze, and it leads him, traitorously, to Remus. Sirius recognises _this_ expression though, it’s Remus’ usual, the face of a pessimist who dares to hope, but knows it won’t go well. Doubt is a shadow cast often across Remus Lupin’s face.

“Shit,” Remus breathes, staring at the wound left there, a great gouge carved out like a canyon or the remnants left after all the precious stones are pulled from the earth.

“Yeah,” Sirius says back, staring at it, staring at the teeth marks bitten deep into his leg. “Let’s go, can we Apparate? Get—get back to the meeting point?”

Remus nods, dumbstruck for a moment it seems, then he stands. When he presses his hands into his thighs he leaves bloody handprints that shine black in the twilight and Sirius can’t look away from them. He’s not sure if it’s because it’s his blood, or because it’s Remus. “Yeah… I don’t know about Apparation, but we can backtrack to the meeting point,” he says, sounding far away and Sirius isn’t sure if that’s good or bad. He wipes a hand on his jeans again though, then holds it out to Sirius. Sweet as the gesture is, it’s futile, because Sirius is saturated in blood and as soon as he takes his hand it’s all over Remus too. “One, two, up—”

Sirius pushes off with his other hand, Remus pulling him up with a reasonable amount of effort for someone so slight, and Sirius is six foot of rangy muscle with a dead weight for a leg. They overbalance a little and Remus stumbles, sending Sirius stumbling too, but they catch each other, arms wrapped tight. “Fuck, shit,” Sirius spits, his head spinning with the rush. Fuck, his vision wavers and blurs and Remus is looking at him with pain in his eyes as if it’s bleeding into to him like his blood is; pain staining them both.

“Godric fuck, Padfoot, when did you get so heavy?” Remus jokes, but his breath is tremulous and his grip is almost painful-tight on Sirius’ waist. The laughter between them is whisked off by the breeze.

Sirius tuts, slinging his arm around Remus’ shoulders to lean more heavily on him. “Rude, Remus, when you’re a gangly mass of limbs,” he mutters, then takes a fortifying breath as he steps forward. He _tries_ not to put weight on his leg, but something must go wrong.

Maybe it’s the adrenaline from their kiss, or the correct counter charm, fading away; maybe it’s being upright, or the fact the trap is no longer keeping the wound somewhat insular. Sirius’ leg gives out with a fresh barrage of pain. It’s worse than the initial wound, worse because it feels like the cool night air is ripping apart every cell, and the blood gushing down his leg worsens with every throb of his heart. Remus’ arm isn’t enough to keep them upright, though he gives a gallant effort, and Sirius tries to twist to avoid landing on that leg but he’s woozy with pain and it smacks into the rocky underbrush beneath their feet.

“Padfoot? Sirius? Sirius!”


	4. Chapter 4

The only thing Remus can focus on is the fact he’s kneeling in Sirius’ blood. Sirius is sprawled atop a blanket of ferns, his eyes glassy as he comes around from a not-quite-unconsciousness. Remus would really, really rather be able to focus on the fact that Sirius has just been kissing him, and he can still taste that peculiar mix of cigarettes and magic like the split-second after a candle burns out.

But Sirius is bleeding, and Remus was right. It’s much worse now the Hex has dissipated, now that the wound is bleeding freely and practically _pouring_ forth. Sirius looks so pale his skin has a greyish cast Remus has only seen once before, the night he ran away from home and turned up in the grate of the Potters’ fireplace when Remus and Peter were visiting. Almost foolishly, Remus had given himself a moment to let optimism germinate in his chest when Sirius had remembered the counter charm.

Perhaps they could make up for lost time, now Sirius had remembered the counter charm. Sirius had loved him as long as Remus has loved Sirius, perhaps even longer. All those moments Remus has filed away in his memory, painful and cruel and just out of reach for him, could have gone somewhere.

They never did.

Remus can’t imagine having to walk from this forest without Sirius by his side. He wants to stride from here under the starlight, staggering and exhausted but alive. He wants Sirius to offer him a cigarette with a snicker winnowing from the corner of his mouth like smoke. He wants to go home, shower off the grime, the magic, the possibility of death whirling around them, and he wants to fall in bed with Sirius and catch up on everything they have missed.

Sirius is ashen, blinking slower and longer and time slows down to a crawl. His hair, streaked in blood too, is swept across his face, his silver eyes peeking through the thatch of black silk like slivers of mercury.

“Sirius, Sirius come on, don’t do this,” Remus says, half to himself as he shifts to kneel next to Sirius and push the hair back from his face. His fingers are shaking, but he has to.

Sirius’ head tips to the side as he rouses a little, and his mouth presses against Remus’ wrist. “Moons.”

“M’here, Padfoot.” Remus’ voice is trembling. His mind is racing trying to figure out what to do. If they can’t get back to the meeting point, they’re sitting ducks for the Death Eaters. The forest has a whole host of defensive spells here, Remus can feel them like the oppressive heat of a warm day, but he wonders if sheer force of will can break through an Anti-Apparition ward, even if it Splinches them.

“I do, you know,” Sirius whispers, his voice lilting.

“What?”

“Love you.”

“Sirius, don’t…” Remus’ knees and thighs are wet with Sirius’ blood. He pushes the sleeves of his jumper up and takes a deep breath, trying to recall the Muggle first aid his mother had drilled into him. “Don’t do that, like you’re dying, don’t.”

Sirius just smiles, his eyes half-open and dark with pain.

“We have to try and stem the bleeding, Padfoot,” Remus tells him, his heart in his throat. His scarf is shoved in the pocket of his jacket, and he pulls it out, wadding it up. Not great, but it will do in a pinch. This is a pinch. This pinches so tight Remus can’t breathe. Sirius just nods, then Remus takes his hands—dripping with blood, _everything_ is dripping with blood, it feels like, Remus won’t ever get the taste from his mouth—and presses them both, along with Remus’ scarf, over the wound.

The noise Sirius makes nearly rends Remus’ heart in two. He screams, a jagged, shorn-off thing he stifles into the shoulder of his jacket as his body goes rigid against the pain. Remus can feel his fingers shaking, sandwiched between Remus’ scarf and his own hands, everything so doused in blood they have melded together. Sirius’ heartbeat is roaring beneath Remus’ fingers now, thudding into Remus’ ribcage. For a moment, Remus thinks Sirius will pass out again, surrender to the thundering stampede of his blood and the pain he can see etched into every pore of his face.

“Fuck,” Sirius breathes, his chin to his chest, breath in short, sharp gasps. “ _Fuck_.”

“Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry,” Remus rambles, watching the blood stain through the tartan pattern of his scarf. There’s _so much_ blood.

“We’re fucking wizards, Remus,” Sirius bites out. He breaks off with another ragged groan, his body spasming from tension and pain. Remus thinks his heartbeat will start getting slower, and slower, and slower, soon, and it makes him want to throw up. “You know healing spells, fucking heal it, not try to squash it shut.”

“You saw what other spells did to it.” Remus looks at Sirius, drinks in every inch of him here, the idea floating free in his brain that this might be the last time he sees those eyes, swimming with the North Sea and the slate grey of an impending storm. He wants to memorise the points of his cupid’s bow, the sharp line of his nose, the way light always hits the planes of his face as if he’s lit to perfection in a museum exhibit. Everything about Sirius is arresting. He’s sprawled here, covered in blood and panting with the pain of it, pallid and grey— _dying_ —and Remus still thinks he’s beautiful. “I don’t want to risk it.”

“You’re a Gryffindor, Moony.” Sirius’ voice sounds a little weaker now. “Be brave, try the damn spell.”

Remus shakes his head; he can’t.

There _is_ one spell he can try though. It feels impossible, to dredge something up from his foundations to pour out of his wand arm, but now is the time for impossibilities. He extracts one hand from their press against Sirius’ thigh, as carefully as he can, but he doesn’t miss the shard of pain over Sirius’ face. “Keep the pressure on, please,” Remus asks, as he reaches for his wand, slippy with blood.

Sirius squeezes his fingers against Remus’, still pressing down. “Okay,” he says, slow and soft; as if he’s falling asleep, dozing on the side of the lake at Hogwarts in the balmy summer warmth.

Remus concentrates on the shape of Sirius’ fingers against his, closes his eyes. He’s all too aware of the desperation scrawled across his face in this moment, but it’s not desperation he needs. A deep breath, a step into his mind, pulling up that memory like a golden thread to follow. It takes a moment, to feel the warmth of it against this blood soaked nightmare, but then it’s _there_. He takes a breath, then another, fingers shaking, gripping.

“ _Expecto Patronum._ ”

When Remus opens his eyes, the spectral creature is sitting on its haunches beside him, waiting for a command. It’s somewhere between a wolf and a dog, though he’s never thought on the distinction too hard, never cared whether it was lupine or canine because to him they were all wound together anyway. He presses his fingers against Sirius’. Wound together.

“To the meeting point. Shacklebolt or Moody, tell them Sirius is badly injured from a Trapping Hex. We need assistance right away,” Remus tells his patronus, not daring to look at Sirius, because in the wake of that memory he can feel how easily tears will prick the corners of his eyes, hot and shameful. The contrast is too great. Sirius is on his periphery though, bathed in that pale blue-white light, looking ethereal. He’s always on Remus’ periphery, always liminal, on the edges of Remus’ being like he knows the boundaries of him better than himself. The swell of light from Remus’ Patronus illuminates the way blood is spreading beneath him, soaking his shirt, his fingers, his jeans. Everything is covered in it.

They are plunged back into the relative darkness as the wolf-dog lopes off into the forest, the light slowly fading. The last dregs of it cling to the mercury swirl of Sirius’ irises as he stares up at Remus. He hasn’t spoken the whole time Remus has been sending the message, and Remus isn’t even sure if he’s conscious, if he’s here, until he does speak.

“What did you remember?” Sirius’ voice is lilting, sliding from one syllable to the next. He’s far less tense beneath Remus’ palm on his thigh, his fingers only twitching a little now. He’s not relaxed though; his heartbeat is slower, the beat to a funerary dirge.

“What?” Remus drops his wand to the side and pushes damp tendrils of Sirius’ hair from his face.

A chuckle resonates somewhere at the back of Sirius’ throat. “When you cast the Patronus, what memory did you use?”

Remus thinks about lying, as he feels his blood rush to the surface in embarrassment, mottled with shame as if his blood is reaching towards Sirius’ like iron filings to a magnet. He thinks of saying something about summers at the Potters’ house, or that first feast in the Great Hall, or the sight of a stag, rat and dog before him in the Shrieking Shack. But he can’t lie. Not here, now, with this ruby-red earth beneath them and the secrets too heavy to take to the grave hanging between them.

“You,” he says, the word rolling out of his mouth as if it’s the only thing that truly belongs in the space between his tongue and teeth. It feels full of everything he’s never said, everything he’s woken with on the tip of his tongue, everything he falls asleep at night mouthing like a litany, like the rosary he prays again and again—Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, you, you, you.


	5. Chapter 5

_You_.

Sirius blinks. His brain feels heavy, full of slime that he has to wade through, concentrate to lift his head, force his lips to make words. A few moments before he’d been taut with pain, pulled on a stretching rack from head to toe by the agony of it, but now? Now Sirius feels as if his bones have turned to powder, as if the pressure of his and Remus’ hands—intertwined over the great gash in Sirius’ thigh—is spreading out and out like a curse or the steady, inexorable growth of decay. Only it brings numbness, it brings impending darkness instead, because the edges of his vision are blurry, Remus is swimming in and out of focus as if they’re both underwater, swimming in the river near the Potters’, balmy and carefree.

He nearly didn’t ask Remus, quiet as he cast the Patronus, but the idea had simmered away in the sludge of his mind until it had fallen out of his lips without his say so. He feels like now is a time for happy memories to be shared. Remus’ fingers are warm and slick atop his, pressing down as if they might fuse together.

“Me,” Sirius breathes, blinking again as if there is something in his eye but there isn’t.

Remus nods. He presses harder on Sirius’ thigh. “I can try a healing spell, try to stem the bleeding somehow.”

What memory could it be? Does Remus summon one of the strongest spells in the Wizarding world with memories of the four Marauders? Are they all together, happy and laughing? Are they gathered around him after the full moon, dirty, bruised and covered in foliage, but smiling broadly? Those memories are there in Sirius’ mind too, limned in the hallowed gold of nostalgia and hindsight, of naivety and believing that they could make something of themselves. They hurt to think of, only piling onto that pressure spreading through him.

Or is it something else Remus thinks of? Is it something quieter, a moment that Sirius has replayed by himself at night, a moment he has woken with in relief on his eyelids like a rich fresco? Is it the way Remus smiled at him just at the cusp of summer, the window in their living room propped open, cigarettes and rum spiked coffee, a rare moment of peace… almost _hope_? Is it that moment, _that_ moment in sixth year?

The Gryffindor common room, right before NEWTs; the air is thick with worry, with the mutterings of study groups and the occasional outburst of exasperation. They decide, one Friday, to blow it all off, and have a moment to breathe. Sirius and James sneak to Hogsmeade and barter with Aberforth for a cask of Basilisk Fang Ale, and a bottle of Firewhisky. They push sofas together in front of the fire and talk, laugh, joke, pretend the world isn’t about to crumble around them as soon as they step outside the safety of Hogwarts. Sirius drinks too much, as he’s prone to do often, and is sprawled on the floor with his hair braided by Marlene—Godric, fuck, he misses her now—by the end of the night. Remus, ruddy-cheeked and near toppling over himself, hauls Sirius to his feet and leads a laughing parade towards the dorm room. They slip, Sirius can’t remember who slips first, if they pull each other down or if it’s a mutual descent, but they stumble into one of the window alcoves with a bubble of laughter. Remus is pressed tight against the stone frame, with Sirius half-sprawled over him, weight almost entirely around Remus’ shoulders. With one movement he could’ve ducked down and kissed Remus square on the mouth. Just one little movement, barely a Doxy wing, just tipped himself forward and tasted Firewhisky and sweet affection. But he didn’t.

“Don’t…” Sirius licks his lips, tastes copper cauldrons and Knuts again. “Tell me what you thought of.”

Remus’ eyes flicker all over Sirius’ face, something frighteningly akin to the shattering of vulnerability there. He pauses long enough that Sirius feels a handful more of his strength ooze out into that spreading numbness. His breath wicks out of him in a broken rhythm, and Remus must feel it, see it, _sense_ it, because his mouth twists downwards in that way when he’s displeased with himself.

“I… sixth year. Before Newts,” he says, soft, slow.

Sirius feels the corner of his mouth pick up. “When we tripped up the stairs?”

“No, not quite.” Remus shifts, takes a breath, and presses harder against Sirius’ leg.

Sirius braces for the pain, the sharpness like a thousand fresh teeth, but… but it doesn’t come. It’s worse. Somehow the numbness that is assailing Sirius has him more terrified than eons of pain. He’s always been one to feel things, feel them too hard, fast, deep, all at once, but now he feels nothing. To stop the panic sinking truly bone deep, weaving through the exposed muscle and tendons to where the Trapping Hex teeth have left their shadow, Sirius forces himself to look at Remus, at the expression on his face. “Which bit?”

Merlin, Sirius will have this memory seared in his mind. He thinks of an old superstition he read once, in a tome in the Restricted Section, written on skin, that the eye retains an image of the last thing it sees. At the time, fourteen and stowed under the Invisibility Cloak, he’d thought of something stupid, something he can’t even recall now that made he and James guffaw like idiots. Now, though, Sirius smiles to himself at the abject romance, but he thinks of this moment. He’s thankful somehow, that this sight would be preserved forever in the grey of his irises like the brass rubbing of a moment, textured with every emotion Sirius has had to knit away over the years.

Remus, framed by moonlight, curls mussed, looking like everything Sirius has ever wanted in the world has solidified into one being. He looks as if he’s trying not to smile, and there’s a flush grazing the tops of his cheeks, smudging the freckles over the bridge of his nose. “It was… you and James, you’d just gotten back from Hogsmeade, and you threw the Cloak off so dramatically. You were singing the _Boys are Back in Town_ , and…and I don’t know.”

When Remus breaks off to rub a hand over his mouth, rivulets of Sirius’ blood creeping down the arm of his jumper, Sirius feels as if the numbness, cold and hard, is being swept away by something else. Numbness perhaps, but blissful numbness. He should quip something—he can feel the ghost of it behind his teeth, something like _Swept away by my dashing good looks, Moony?_ or _Glad to know my singing voice can summon a Patronus, should I give it a try now?_ but he can’t revive the spirit of it. So he just stays quiet. That blissful numbness is climbing outwards from his ribs.

“I just… You looked so fucking happy, Sirius. You were so carefree and… Christ, you were so beautiful, _are_ so beautiful. I sat there just looking at you, feeling like all of that joy was flowing over into me and…” Remus’ eyes, Sirius realises, are shining with tears, strings of saltwater pearls along his fair eyelashes. “It was the first time I ever thought I could have anything like love. The first time I thought that kind of bone-deep devotion was actually possible, like I would be able to walk right up to Voldemort and end this all if it only meant I could keep you that happy.”

Sirius’ heart twists. Hope is not something he’s accustomed to, never an optimist and never letting himself think beyond the next day, week at most, but all of a sudden, Sirius wants to survive. He wants to _live_. He suddenly _wants_ to, and now he’s bleeding and his heart is twisting, twisting, twisting—oh, it’s not just the grief of losing years of being close to Remus, it’s not just the fact they could have had all this time together, saved themselves the heartache of mutual pining. It’s his heart too, his pulse weakening, skipping a beat, then another.

A weak little breath slips out of Sirius’ lips. He intends it a chuckle, another quip of some kind, but instead it shifts into a sob of sorts. He can’t look away from Remus, just leaning against the rocks and looking at him because he wants to save this moment, to eke it out into the time he has left. “Fuck, Moony,” he chokes, lifting a hand to try and wipe his face but his hands feel too heavy and all he succeeds in doing is wiping blood across his cheek.

“I didn’t… it’s a happy memory, Padfoot,” he says, sounding stricken as he shuffles closer still. “You’ve got blood, on your… well fuck, everywhere.” He goes to wipe Sirius’ cheek, but realises his sleeve is covered in blood, then the body of his shirt too, everything is covered in Sirius’ blood. “Fuck… it was a happy memory, I swear.”

Sirius goes to shake his head, but his head swirls and maybe he doesn’t shake his head at all but the whole world shakes instead. “It is, it’s happy,” Sirius agrees, having to focus on every syllable, the press of his lips, the point of his tongue—they all feel alien. “It’s fucking happy, but _Merlin_ , Remus, we could have had _years_.”

Remus bites his lip; his eyes, marble dripping in honey, blur and shift in Sirius’ vision. “We still can, Sirius, I swear.”

Numbness and pain, knitting together, tighter and tighter stitches across Sirius’ lungs. His breathing is short and shallow, nowhere near enough oxygen but he can’t make himself heave a deeper breath. He wants to stay awake, he wants to stay here, but he wants to sleep so badly.

“Sirius, no, no. You have to stay here, Sirius. Stay with me, please.” The softest touch on the side of Sirius’ neck, lifting a little to support him with the way Sirius feels boneless from head to toe. He just wants to sleep, desperately. But he knows, somewhere in that rational part of his brain, that if he sleeps now, he won’t wake. Remus’ words are like a spell of their own, imbuing him with the barest of strength.

“Yeah, m’trying, trying,” Sirius mutters, turning to nuzzle into Remus’ hand like he does when he’s Padfoot.

“We got this. Come on, Padfoot. You have to stay here, please don’t go, not now.” Remus’ touch flitters across the top of Sirius’ cheekbone. “Help is on the way, isn’t it?”

 _On the way_. How long will it be? How long can Sirius last? His pulse is like a lacewing against his ribs, slower and softer with every beat. Sirius can’t think.

“Kiss me.”

“Sirius.” Remus is closer now. “I’m gonna—just hold on, please. Stay with me. I need you here. I’m gonna heal the wound, we have to try _something_.”

“Just give me five minutes to try and learn all the parts of you I’ve kept myself from for years,” Sirius whispers, leaning up to kiss him, breath across his lips. Sirius is close enough to hear the broken little whine of pain Remus gives. It _is_ painful, it feels painful to acknowledge how long they could have had. Now they have minutes. It feels like Sirius breathes his last breath against Remus’ lips, scared to inhale again for it to stay there forever.

Remus kisses back tentatively, blood and chapped lips, the tang of desperation. One last surge of movement runs through Sirius at the press of their lips, as if Remus is pouring life into him like some kind of reverse-Dementor, bits of his soul spilling into Sirius. Or maybe it’s not Remus’ soul after all—maybe it’s the shards of himself Sirius has been giving to Remus for years, kept safe and passed back to him. With those fresh-old pieces of his soul, Sirius lifts a hand, tangles it in Remus’ sandy curls to hold him close. The dry locks catch on his ragged fingernails, on the callus of his forefinger, and Sirius’ muscles twitch with the urge to just _hold on_.

Just as Sirius rakes his teeth over Remus’ lower lip, slow and rich, desperate and gasping, he feels a pulse through the air. Remus’ magic smells like pine needles and the sea air, and that’s the only reason Sirius knows Remus is casting. Likely a healing spell, as he’d said before Sirius had hauled him close and kissed him as if he were oxygen, but Sirius can’t really feel it, can’t really feel _anything_. But the scent of Remus’ magic envelops him. It makes him think of the Gryffindor dormitories, of opening the window and climbing onto the rooftop beneath, all four of them dog-piled together and learning wandless, wordless magic to light their cigarettes or write in sparks in the night sky.

Sirius pulls back, or maybe more accurately, he slumps back against the ferns and rocks beneath him. It feels as if every bit of him has slowed down, barely ticking over and it’s going to stop. That last breath had grazed Remus’ lips and maybe, just maybe, Sirius has poured the shards of Remus’ soul he’s been keeping safe back to him.


	6. Chapter 6

The sun rises.

Sunrise has always been Remus’ favourite time of day. An early riser all through his childhood, he and his Ma would go into the garden and watch the sky stain a whole cacophony of colours. Remus would be in charge of the bird feeders, light seeds in the summer then berries and suet in the winter. He remembers, pink-cheeked and bundled in a goose-down coat, watching the sunrise. After he’d been bitten, sunrise was a blessing too. Sunrise meant no more werewolf, meant no more moon hanging in the sky, tormenting him with its silver rays, whispering _soon, you’ll be mine_.

Remus has always welcomed the sunrise; turned his face to the warming rays and taken a breath to start the new day.

He doesn’t want this one.

For the first time in his memory, Remus wants to bundle the sun up and throw it back. He wants to wipe his hand across the sky and smudge away all the colours he can see smeared there. Never before has Remus wanted the night back, but now he wants it so badly it hurts. Remus wants the comfort blanket of the nighttime, wants the constellations back in the sky, their colours instead.

The sun warming the back of his neck feels like a cruel joke.

The conservatory at the back of Professor McGonagall’s house—Minerva now, they’ve been out of school for two years—is bright and airy, filled with plants, Muggle and magical. It’s usually a serene place, the few times Remus has been there for Order meetings and eaten a chocolate chip biscuit from a fine china plate and hidden a snigger behind his hand at the way Sirius had been taking the piss, drinking his tea with his pinky stuck out, perched on the edge of his chair like some upper class moron.

Now, it feels cold, empty. Sirius is lying on the wicker sofa, spelled wider and longer for his tall, broad shouldered frame to fit there. If Remus concentrates, sat in the matching wicker chair a few feet away, he can see his chest rising and falling minutely. The sheets Professor Mc— _Minerva_ —summoned up to cover the sofa are stained a deep red beneath Sirius’ leg, as if all the blood in his body—the stuff usually just beneath the surface, making him flush red when he’s laughing too hard or the blood that darkens his cheeks when he’s furious—is on the sheets instead, and it leaves his alabaster skin grey and pallid.

Poppy—that’s always easier for Remus, she’d been Poppy since fourth year after he’d vomited on her after a bad moon—is in the kitchen, talking in a low voice to someone. Minerva had Floo called her, and she’d appeared in the fire a few moments later, looking more than a little frightened. She’d pushed her sleeves up and gotten to work, all with Remus hovering at the far end of the room, praying with everything he had that his old school nurse could save the day once again.

Remus isn’t really sure how they got to Minerva’s house. He remembers briefly, after Sirius had passed out that last time, with the press of his lips still a ghost of feeling against Remus’ mouth, the bluish light of his Patronus emerging through the trees. He’d been utterly unashamed of the tears scattering the tops of his cheeks as he’d held onto Sirius, keeping up a low stream of susurrations to him, pleading with him to _stay here_. If he closes his eyes for too long, even in the morning sunlight and the warmth of the conservatory, he can see Sirius slumped on the ground. Remus can hear his own voice repeating those words— _No, no, Sirius. You have to stay here, please? Sirius? Sirius, come on, wake up. You can hold on, please, please hold on. Don’t leave me, don’t go, you have to stay. I love you, I love you, I love you._

Shacklebolt and Moody had appeared, with someone else too but Remus didn’t look at anything but Sirius’ face, his beautiful face, streaked with blood. Someone had put their arm around Remus, as Shacklebolt and Moody led the hurried retreat back to the meeting point, Sirius floating between them on a stretcher one of them had summoned. He doesn’t remember who, not sure if he’d even looked up at their face because he was replaying every moment he had shared with Sirius in his mind. _Sirius? Sirius, stay awake, stay here, please. Sirius? Padfoot, please?_

As if pulled along on some unerring track, Remus stands from the chair that creaks in relief, and crosses over to that sofa. He almost goes to sit on the edge, uncaring for the fact the blood is soaking everything around Sirius like some ruby shroud. He remembers Minerva casting a quick cleansing charm over him though, so he’s no longer dripping in the stuff. Instead, he kneels on the herringbone tiles before the sofa, and rests his head against Sirius’ shoulder. _Sirius, stay here. Not now, not after this, not now I know you. Please, stay here, stay with me._

Remus has never been a religious person. Even when he and Ma went to the church for midnight mass, he had sat and looked at the other worshippers, imagined why they were here, what they might be praying for. Here, though, kneeling in front of his best friend, at the altar to him, Remus finds himself asking what great price would be needed to bring him back. _Bring him back. Give him back to me. I need him here._

The light arcs through the clouds above, the low-hanging branches of the hawthorn tree in Minerva’s garden. It breaks up into shafts of light as if the hand of that Muggle God Remus has never believed in might come down and press one golden finger against Sirius’ chest and say _here, keep him_.

Remus presses his forehead against Sirius’ shoulder, listening to the shallow spikes of his breathing, shuddering in and out. He’s lost so much blood. Even with the potions Poppy had poured down his throat and the cloth soaked in _Sanguivita_ she’d instructed Remus to hold over his mouth. He can hear the hummingbird of Sirius’ heart within his chest, tries to imagine—as he puts his hand over his sternum—his magic flowing out of him like starlight, and flooding into Sirius’ chest to replenish what he has lost.

“Remus,” comes a voice from the doorway. He doesn’t need to lift his head to recognise the voice as Poppy.

“How bad is it?” Remus croaks, his voice unused for hours, but for _Sirius, stay here, don’t leave me, don’t you_ bloody _leave me_. “Is he… is he dead? Dying?”

Poppy doesn’t answer for long enough that Remus feels a sob bury itself in his throat. It wraps around his vocal chords and makes it so he’s sure if he tries to speak, it will sprout. He tells himself that he can hear Sirius breathing, so he’s alive. He _has_ to be alive.

“He’s not dead, Remus,” says Poppy, softly, as if she’s trying not to lie.

“But…” Remus still doesn’t lift his head. Sirius smells of the forest and the heavy tang of magic. Remus can still taste the other man’s kisses on his lips. He’s not ready for this.

“It’s… it’s very serious.”

 _No, I’m Sirius_. He can imagine the smirk on Sirius’ lips, eager to take advantage of that pun whenever he could. But he stays quiet, unconscious or sleeping; not dead.

Poppy continues, with a tight little sigh. “The Hex was very deep, he lost a lot of blood. He might… he might lose his leg, if he pulls through.”

“I know.” Another pause, three of Sirius’ sharp little breaths. “We couldn’t remember the counter charm, it took a few tries.”

“Not a Hex I would be able to counter off the top of my head, so I’m glad you were able to get it at all. You’re both incredibly bright wizards.”

Remus can hold the sob back no longer. He clenches his back teeth together but he can feel the tears stinging his eyes and his shoulders quiver. “I can’t—I can’t let him die. Even if he’s got one fucking leg, Poppy, I can’t lose him, I can’t—shit, _James_.”

James won’t know. James has been locked away with Lily and the baby, he’s blissfully unaware that his brother in all but blood is half-dead, and even if he did know, he couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Remus imagines having to break the news to him. Would he be able to see him in person? Be able to wrap his arms around James as he grieves and screams and cries whilst Lily holds Harry to her chest and her tears drip into his hair? Or would he have to do it by Floo call, or _letter?_ Would the parchment be tear-stained, his hand shaky? Would James throw the letter into the fire?

A hand falls on Remus’ shoulder. “He should pull through. I’ve done what I can, and you did well stemming the bleeding as much as you did,” says Poppy, her voice gentle and soft like it would be when she awoke him after the full, with a pain relieving potion in hand and a slight smile on her face.

No pain relieving potion would ease this. It feels as if his hands are still soaked in blood, as if it has steeped through his insides and will be there forever. “I can’t… he can’t, Poppy, he can’t. You have to help him.”

“I’ve done all I can.”

Remus is alone again as the door to the conservatory creaks shut. He lets out a shaky breath and closes his eyes. _Sirius, stay here, stay awake, stay with me._

When Remus wakes next it’s to the blurred colours of late afternoon. He’s in a bed he doesn’t recognise, and Sirius is not with him. Sirius is not with him. Remus sits bolt upright and drags a hand through his hair. There is still blood—Sirius’ blood—under his fingernails and it distracts him just for a moment before he swings his legs from the bed and trips out of the door.

The stairs creak beneath his feet as he clatters down them—barefoot, his shoes are… somewhere—and the noise must carry because Professor McGona— _Minerva_ —appears in the doorway to what must be the sitting room, the light of a candle, the noise of the wireless, beyond. Her salt and pepper hair is drawn back but loose around her shoulders, and her deep green tartan shawl is tucked tight over her shoulders.

“Mr. Lupin,” she says, then gestures to the door to the conservatory. “You drifted off so we thought you’d appreciate somewhere a little more comfortable. Mr. Black is—”

Remus doesn’t need to hear anymore. He all but _runs_ through the door to the conservatory, breath twisting coolly in his throat. He catches the door before it bangs on the wall behind it, and nearly crumbles with the sight before him.

“Moony,” Sirius says. He’s sitting up on the wicker sofa, a blanket over his legs. Sirius has never looked so still, never so weak and small. Remus stops in the doorway, skidding to a halt because Sirius is _alive_. He’s ashen and drawn and his silk-black hair is plastered damp to his head, but he’s _alive._

“Sirius, fucking hell, you—” Remus cuts himself off, shaking his head. He strides the length of the conservatory a hurried handful of steps, and is reminded of how fabulous Minerva McGonagall is when there’s a wicker chair right where he’s going to sit down.

Sirius holds a hand out to him, and his fingers are shaking but he’s _alive_. “This has got to be the worst way to confess your feelings.” He smiles, wryly, and looks like himself all at once.

Remus takes both Sirius’ hands in his, presses them together so Remus can’t tell where his shaking fingers stop and Sirius’ shaking fingers begin. “Not the greatest, but… we’re still… well, fuck, the elephant in the room, Sirius.” Remus bites his lip, eyes flickering down over Sirius’ form, the blanket over his lap. “Your leg?”

“Yeah…” Sirius tips his head back onto the arm of the sofa. “It’s… we’re matching now,” he says, a little sad, a little humorous because Sirius has always dealt with all the awful things on his shoulders with humour. Then, with his free hand not caught between Remus’, he tugs the blanket back from his thighs.

For a moment, Remus is distracted by the fact Sirius’ jeans are not on his legs, and his pale, muscular thighs are lean and long and so temptingly bare that Remus wishes he was on his knees again to see what his skin tastes like. But then, Godric, not caught up with his own frighteningly strong urge to seize Sirius and snog him because he’s _alive_ , he realises what Sirius means.

Fenrir Greyback had caught Remus around the arm when he was five years old and searching the hedge at the bottom of the garden for fairies. Dragged into the underbrush, Remus had screamed and cried and tried to crawl away from the not-quite-a-dog that had pounced on him for reasons he didn’t quite understand. Greyback had clamped his jaws around the meat of Remus’ thigh and pulled him in further. Remus tells his parents he doesn’t remember what happened. But he does.

The scar around his thigh, arcing above his kneecap, is perfectly dotted with puckered knots of scar tissue in the shape of teeth—of _fangs_. In most lights it’s a silver-white now, after years of potions and charms, but for the night of the full, when it turns livid and red.

The scar around Sirius’ thigh, arcing above his kneecap, is perfectly dotted with puckered knots of tissue, too. It looks like it’s had a year of full moons, flushed red and angry with blood and precariously knitted back together with all of Poppy’s hard work. It’s scabbed and almost black, the flesh around it concave and tense.

Remus tells his parents he doesn’t remember what his scar looked like, how bloody and vile it was at first. He tells them he doesn’t remember overhearing the Healer tell his father that he might lose the leg. But he does. Filled with a strange haunted feeling, Remus eases one hand away from Sirius’ and presses it so gently over the scar. When he lifts his gaze to Sirius’, his eyes are swimming like the inside of a Pensieve, and maybe he does hold every memory Remus wants to keep.

“I know I told you scars made you look incredibly cool when we were twelve, but I don’t think this one counts as such.” Sirius’ mouth twitches up at the corners and Remus huffs a soft laugh. He pushes his forehead against Sirius’ shoulder, then laces the fingers of their still joined hands together. They’re not home free, Remus knows. The war still goes on, and Sirius is going to be hurting for a long time. But he’s alive. They’re both _alive_.

“Don’t be stupid. You’re as cool as me now,” Remus mutters, as he leans in and presses a kiss to Sirius’ mouth, and instead of copper cauldrons and Knuts, he tastes like _hope_.


End file.
